"At the center of reality, where dimensions intersect and the laws of nature and causality reside, there exists a great Tower.
It is known as Eden, and it is the birthplace of the gods. Long has it been said that anyone with sufficient desire will make their way to Eden in an attempt to ascend and fulfill their dreams.
For to ascend is to become closer to the gods, and to become close to god is to obtain all that you desire."
- Excerpt from an Arch Priest's dissertation
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The void between dimensions:
It's funny how easily all of the things you take for granted can be undone, how the little things we once accepted unquestioningly can become sources of anxiety and paranoia and depression. Perhaps your home caught fire once, and now you'll never leave the house without double checking that you haven't left any candles or lanterns lit. Or maybe you lost a friend once, and now you relive your last moments with them over and over, wishing you'd teased them a little less that day and let them know just a little more how much they meant to you. Or perhaps it's something else entirely, or even many different things that make you feel keenly that which you used to take for granted.
As I drift through the void between dimensions I'm struggling not to fall into the void within my mind; that endless pit of possibilities and what-ifs that make up a past I know I cannot change and yet I can't help but question everything.
What could I have done differently?
Could I have saved them somehow? Saved everyone?
Did I truly have no choice or had I been playing at god?
Deciding the fates of others time and time again, had I grown complacent as I grew in power? Had I grown corrupt?
How often was I wrong? How often was I right?
How often could I have done better? Would it ever have been enough?
And if I knew those answers would it even make a difference? When the truth of the matter is that we were apparently no more than puppets of fate, cycle after cycle, futilely chasing, struggling, fighting, resisting... just to maintain a brief balance before it all began again.
The struggles, the suffering, the despair, the hope, the resolve, the friendships, the enemies, the light and the dark. Those who time and time again rose to the occasion with brilliant, unwavering conviction, standing fast against all consuming despair, protecting everything they held dear... until they could rise no more. Was it truly for this?
Was our only recourse for salvation my abandoning those I'd sworn to protect? I bitterly cursed whatever orchestrated such a fate upon our world. If there was a way to save them all I would find it. For I was Sola, and bearing the name of the very planet I'd left behind, I will stand unfaltering against any odds to change the fate of my world and make things right!
...just as soon as I get to wherever it is I'm going, who knew that dimension hopping would be so boring?
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Eden Floor 1:
Ars' day wasn't shaping up to be as grand as he'd imagined it, when he'd been told that today marked the day he'd be embarking as a Seeker ascending the Tower, he'd imagined something a bit more grand than trekking through the forest trying to find Weir. His brother had told him that the town was located at the center of the floor and hadn't elaborated further, naive as he'd been at the time he just assumed that it would be a simple matter to find it. After walking through the forest for three hours however, he wasn't sure if he was actually any closer to the center of the floor or not. As he continued walking he suddenly felt a sharp sense of vertigo followed by his ears popping as the pressure around him plummeted and a sudden rush of wind swept by him in the direction he'd been heading, and just as quickly as it happened it vanished.
"Ok, what the fuck was that?" he whispers to himself while summoning a seemingly plain red orb to his hand. The orb was actually an artifact called a Byun that his brother had gifted him, it was also the preferred weapon wielded by his family. The Byun once thrown would retain it's momentum and continue to bounce endlessly until he caught it again, and by precisely punching and kicking it the speed and force of the ball would drastically increase which could cause extreme damage to anyone hit, whoever the artifact was linked to could also manipulate the spin of the Byun while in the air to make alterations to the trajectory of the ball when it bounced. It was an incredibly versatile yet difficult to master weapon.
Taking a deep breath Ars shifted his stance to be ready to throw his Byun at a moments notice, he slowed his steps and kept alert for any other signs that something was off, for all he knew his first test of the floor may have already started. It wouldn't do to carelessly continue on and risk failing if that were the case, he had too much to prove to fail so early, both to himself and his family. Looking more closely at the forest around him he noticed that it'd grown eerily quiet, none of the usual chattering of nature you'd expect from a temperate forest was present around him, even the wind seemed to have stopped. It was if the world was holding it's breath along with him..
"Hello-"
Ars whirled as the voice sounded out behind him, his right arm reactively whipping out as he rotated and launched his Byun towards the source of the voice. His eyes widened as he realized it was just a female beastkin standing a handful of paces away, he'd been so tense that he immediately attacked without thinking the moment he heard her voice. Grimacing and internally chastising himself, he willed as much lateral spin as he could manage into the red orb rocketing towards the girls' chest before it hit her in hopes that it'd ricochet off of her and minimize some of the force from the collision. He mentally prepared to apologize to the girl who was presumably in the same boat as he was, lost looking for Weir when they also experienced that sudden onset of vertigo and subsequent drop in pressure and then deciding to go and investigate in case it was a part of their tests. While he was internally panicking and wondering how to salvage the situation however, the girl just straight up reaches out and plucks the Byun out of the air as if it were no more than a normal ball.
Ball casually held in one hand, she walks over to him and hands his Byun back, "Sorry for startling you, I'm just a bit lost and you were the first person I saw since getting here."
He numbly took it back from her hand, wondering just what kind of monster he'd run into that could catch someone else's bound artifact like it was nothing. Artifacts naturally rejected those who weren't their owners, in the case of a Byun this meant that it normally couldn't be caught or stopped by anyone other than the owner. Anyone else who tried such a thing would either have it bounce out of their grasp immediately or be at risk of having their limb dislocated or, in extreme cases, torn off as the momentum of the Byun couldn't be stopped by them. Yet this beastkin before him did it with seemingly no effort, he wasn't sure if it was meant as a threat to him or if she was even aware of how incredible what she'd just done was. For now he decided that he would take the proverbial olive branch and not antagonize the girl further.
"Ah, no I should be the one apologizing. I'm also lost and you're the first person I've seen as well so I guess my nerves got the better of me." He awkwardly chuckles in reply, reaching up and scratching the back of his head nervously. "I'm Ars by the way," he introduces himself while taking a closer look at the girl before him.
Vivid purple irises and catlike pupils look back at him, surrounded by black eyeliner with purple eye shadow, her left eye is mostly covered by her wild black and purple hair that's been messily put into a ponytail. Her face is covered by a form fitting black cloth mask, engraved silver rims the edges of the mask before spiking up into a single horn over her right temple. Black cat ears stand alert on top of her head, which still puts her over a foot shorter than him, standing at around 5 feet tall.
She's wearing a dark purple and grey trench coat, a black shirt, baggy black pants, and calf high black leather boots. Her neck is slender and pale, wrapped in dual chokers, one with a pair of gold wings surrounding an onyx at the front and the other with a pair of platinum wings surrounding a jade. Her hands are wrapped around the palms, leaving her fingers exposed, her nails are kept short yet slightly pointed like claws and are perhaps unsurprisingly painted purple. On her right side sits an empty scabbard longer than her arm, bereft of any decorations but the black coloration seems to shimmer and ripple with a pearlescent sheen to it the longer he looks at it.
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"Like what you see?" she quirks her eyebrows at him as he reddens slightly in realization that he'd been staring before she introduces herself, "You may call me Sola." She stops for a moment seemingly deliberating on what to say next before continuing, "Ars was it you who called me here?"
"Called you here? Like to the Tower?"
"The Tower? I don't know what that is, but I was traveling through the void when I suddenly felt that this was where I needed to go, and after cutting my way into this dimension you were the only one nearby. So I ask again, were you the one who called me here?" She replies with a straight face and a gesture to her empty scabbard as if she didn't just say several absurd things successively.
"Void travel? C-cutting your way into this dimension?! W-w-wait before we even get to that, you don't even know what the Tower is? Like y'know, Eden.. the conjunction of all dimensions, where the gods live and reign and all that?" He stares at her expectantly, waiting for the light of recognition to appear in her eyes, but if anything she seems even more lost. "Hoo~ where do I even begin," he breathes out heavily, "I thought everyone knew about Eden, even if you're from another dimension they should have stories or myths or legends about it at the very least. Wait a second though, if you're actually here from another dimension. Then that means you're a True Seeker! Whoaa~"
"A True Seeker?" she asks quizzically, obviously trying to piece things together from Ars' progressively more excitable responses.
"Like Allant, or Samsara, or Nezi, or-" he pauses for a second as he realizes that Sola obviously wouldn't know any of the people he's mentioning, "Ehm, well they're all people who became very famous within Eden. So basically Seekers are what we call those who are attempting to ascend the Tower, but most of the Seekers ascending now already come from within the Tower, families and nations and such have been established within the Tower for millennia after all. So Seekers come from people who already lived in and were born in the Tower, families will send their scions to ascend as a rite of passage, governments will send their soldiers as training, others will independently choose to become Seekers to fulfill their personal dreams, and others simply for a chance at fame and prestige. There's any number of reasons people will become Seekers, and True Seekers aren't really any different in that aspect. The difference is that True Seekers are those who weren't born within the Tower, they were summoned here by the Tower itself, and many True Seekers have become very famous or infamous within Eden's history."
Her brows furrow for a moment as she pieces through the flood of information for something actually useful to what she'd initially asked, "So basically if I'm what you call a 'True Seeker' then that means it was the Tower that summoned me here?"
"Well yeah-"
"Ok so why? Why does the Tower summon certain people to become True Seekers as you call it? And why the name Seekers?"
He waits a moment to see if she's finished before answering, "The Tower doesn't summon people for a purpose of it's own, but to allow people the chance to pursue their desires, if you have a strong enough desire it's said the Tower will call out to you and give you the chance to Seek that which you desire. Hence the term Seekers, because no matter what it is that you're seeking; be it fame, fortune, love, salvation, power, apotheosis, or-" Ars' expression hardens with resolve as he gazes into the distance before he continues, "-escaping ones fate, as long as you continue to ascend you can find it."
Sola's eyes seem to reflect a myriad of emotions at this, before she turns and looks up into the trees beside them.
"Ooh, is this where we regale one another with our tragic backstories and all go into why we became seekers?" A new voice speaks up from above them.
Ars turns, a bit startled at having been snuck up on yet again, and sees a blonde haired girl sitting on a tree branch, her green eyes stare down at him mockingly. To her side stands a visually indistinct humanoid, seemingly covered entirely in black. Ars recognizes it as a type of golem artifact likely sent with the girl in order to protect her, outing her as likely being a scion of some wealthy family. Ars tries to reign in his expression and not give away the surprise that he feels, at least he managed to refrain from attacking as his first reaction this time.
"And you are?" Sola gazes at the girl seemingly unimpressed.
Somersaulting down from the branch the girl gives a slight bow before introducing herself with a smile, "Amelia de Felaine, charmed I'm sure. And this is my servant and bodyguard Kuro." She gestures to the humanoid golem and it also does a small bow, though it stays perched in the tree. The name Felaine certainly explains why the girl's family could afford to send a golem to protect and serve her, as her family worships and is supposedly blessed by the god of wealth.
"Sola." Sola introduces herself, briefly nodding at Amelia and Kuro before turning to Ars and giving him an indecipherable look.
"And I'm Ars," he smiles at Amelia, "and I'm-"
"Also lost I take it?" Amelia interrupts with a sigh, before turning and muttering to herself. Something about her expectations unsurprisingly being let down if he read her lips right.
"W-well yes, we are lost-" Ars starts to say.
"Were lost," Sola corrects him before turning and walking in a seemingly random direction. Leaving Ars standing there confused for a moment, glancing over at Amelia as if unsure what to do.
Amelia looks at him and scoffs, "Well are we going to follow her or not? Or did you have something better in mind?"
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I could feel it again, that same sensation, skirting the edges of my consciousness, that tantalizing promise of everything that I desired. It was this feeling that called me here, lead me to this 'Eden', and now it was presumably calling to me again to set me on the right path. For whatever reason, I knew Ars wasn't lying, ascending the Tower was the key to everything, I knew it and believed it in the same way that I believed the sun would rise again after setting. I have no idea how high I'll have to climb to change the fate of a planets worth of people but even if it's to the gods themselves or beyond I would do it. I won't even consider failing.
I have to resist the urge to quicken my pace as the three behind me decide to follow me after a moment of deliberation. Though I was fixated on the feeling that was guiding me, I didn't want to leave behind potential allies as well as sources of information. As I still knew next to nothing about Eden, I would need to rely on the knowledge of others while I was still figuring things out, and I wasn't sure it was purely a coincidence that I ran into Ars first, perhaps I ended up near him first in order to gain a simple understanding of things, or perhaps his fate and my own were somehow tied. As I walked I started paying more attention to the forest around me, at a glance it was a fairly standard temperate forest, maybe having more vibrant colors than you'd typically expect but I've seen all sorts of fantastical fauna throughout my adventures so I'd still call this one standard. What was strange was the feeling I got from it, it felt both older and younger than it looked, like it was both decades and millennia old all at once.
It's not really in my nature to resist the urge to ask questions so I decide to turn to my companions and ask if they have any insights on it, "Does this forest feel strange to either of you? Like it's both new and immeasurably ancient?"
I expected Ars to respond as he seems to enjoy explaining things to others but surprisingly Amelia speaks up first, "Well the first floor of Eden serves as a 'Tutorial' so it's constantly changing over the years to enable all sorts of trials and challenges for new Seekers to learn and train in. At the same time since Eden has been around for like, literally forever, the space itself is likely incredibly ancient."
Ars takes this opportunity to chime in as well, "Yes the first floor is meant to give Seekers a simplified and slightly safer experience of some of the things you can expect from later floors, hence it being called the 'Tutorial Floor' or even the 'Floor of Tests'. Seekers will usually spend a brief amount of time on the floor completing various challenges or quests, there's even classes you can sign up for in Weir to learn various things that may be useful as you ascend."
"So how do we ascend?"
"Er, well we need to find the town of Weir first and then the Floor Ascendant should explain what the criteria for ascending is," Ars replies.
"Floor Ascendant?" I continue to shamelessly display my ignorance with what I'm sure are questions that're considered common knowledge to my companions. Unsurprisingly I think I can see Amelia's opinion of my intelligence plummeting in real time, while Ars just seems happy to be able to teach someone.
I can't quite tell if it's pity in her eyes or a burgeoning antipathy when she responds, "Well Ascendants are people who've climbed to or past the 79th floor." She pauses, green eyes catching my purple ones as if to make sure I'm following along, "and Floor Ascendants are those who've climbed to or past the 79th floor but have decided to take a break from climbing and help run tests for Seekers on a specific floor."
"Hmm, so will every floor require some sort of test in order to ascend?"
"Yes exactly! In some way or another, every floor has a test that must be completed in order to ascend. A lot of the tests have changed over the years, but some floors tests haven't changed in centuries and are iconic!" Ars is quickly outing himself as a bit of a fanboy when it comes to certain things about Eden, such as 'True Seekers' and now these 'iconic' floor tests.
"Ahh, speaking of Iconic! I can't wait to reach the 14th floor, my family owns one of the major resorts on the floor and it's been so long since I've been to the beach," Amelia says with obvious longing.
Ars and I chuckle at Amelia's outburst, letting the conversation come to a natural lull as we continue making our way through the woods. Though I obviously have many more questions I could ask, when a new adventure is at hand you don't want to spoil it for yourself. So I instead turn my gaze forward, and though the weight on my shoulders hasn't lessened, I take some solace in knowing the path laid out before me.
For so long as there's a way, I will continue ever onward, ascending higher and higher to obtain all that I desire.